Prosecutor
by SoraStarkiller
Summary: There was a reason Matt Murdock wasn't a prosecutor. Short character piece explaining why Matt Murdock didn't chose the most obvious career path as an attorney who fights for justice.


There was a reason Matt Murdock wasn't a prosecutor.

The logical path was to work for the District Attorney's office. He believed in justice, and what better way to dispense it than to put murderers behind bars? But when he graduated from law school he didn't so much as apply to the DA's office. It wasn't as though he hadn't toyed with the idea before, Matt had seriously considered it. It's what made sense. But even in law school, deep inside, he had always known he would fight injustice beyond the law. Foggy was right. Why else would he feel the absolute need to keep himself in top physical condition, to hone his skills? Matt had known since the beginning that the law wasn't enough.

That truth was even more apparent as he sat in the gallery and listened to the closing arguments of the trial. Matt had followed the case since it started the week before. The defendant didn't look like a killer. He wore a nice suit and had a bewildered, almost innocent, looking expression on his face. If it weren't for the fact that he'd led the police to the body of the young girl it would have been near impossible to believe he'd done it. Of course, that was the problem. The jury was never told the defendant knew where the body was. That evidence was inadmissible. All because the police had interrogated the defendant after he had invoked his right to counsel. Fruit of the poisonous tree.

Matt set his jaw as he heard the jury be excused for deliberation. He could hear the prosecutor's frustration as he cursed the Fifth Amendment. But it was a prosecutor's job, as counsel for the state, for the people, to uphold the constitution, even when it meant standing by while a guilty man walked free. Matt knew how this would play out.

It took twenty minutes for the jury to decide. A verdict of not guilty. Not even a hung jury, just 'not guilty'. But really, there wasn't enough evidence there. The prosecutor knew it was a bad case from the beginning, but had taken it anyway because the defendant was guilty. That was something Matt was sure he couldn't do. Matt stood and left the court room. This wasn't the defendant's first kill, but it would be his last if Matt had anything to say about it.

That's why he couldn't be a prosecutor, because he couldn't take an oath to uphold the Constitution and then break that oath every night. Matt could do a search and seizure without a warrant, he didn't have to honor a killer's right to remain silent, he could do more than any prosecutor on the outside. But that was almost the worse part.

When he first graduated from law school, Matt thought he could change things through the law, that he could help people, prevent injustice. But even then somewhere inside, he knew it wasn't enough. He'd dismissed the idea of being able to change the system from the inside. That's why he'd gone into private practice. Already from the beginning Matt knew nothing he did in that world would make much of a difference. Not really anyway.

So he'd become the masked man. He thought he could help that way. But every night his sense of efficacy was slowly chipped away at. It seemed like the most he could hope for was to keep the status quo. Things never seemed to get better. Maybe not worse, but not better either. What was the point if he couldn't change anything? But he couldn't give up. It wasn't in him. Murdock's don't quit.

He didn't think he could take it if he were in the place of the prosecutor. Watching a guilty man go free and knowing that in some small way it was his fault. His fault he couldn't convince a jury of what he knew to be true. Maybe that was why he'd dismissed the idea of working for the DA's office so quickly at the beginning of his law school career.

Sometimes Matt hated the law. The system was imperfect. But at the same time it did protect the innocent. It protected peoples' rights. In a way it mirrored his own inner conflict. By day he observed the law, using it to right wrongs. But it was restrictive. So by night he ignored the law completely, took right and wrong into his own hands. Somehow though, it would be worse if by day he honored the guilty's constitutional rights and by night completely and utterly disregarded them.

No, there was a reason Matt Murdock was not a prosecutor.

-A/N-

Very short silly piece, but it really bothers me that he's a private defense attorney/general practitioner when it seems like the obvious choice is for him to be a prosecutor. But maybe he just likes the flexible hours of being his own boss (haha).

Comments and criticism are really really appreciated! I tried writing in a little bit different of a style than I usually do (if you can even tell...), so feedback would be nice :-)


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